LAKE COUNTY, Fla. -- A convicted sex offender is back behind bars. Agents say he was involved in a child pornography ring and collected hundreds of pictures in his Lake County home. Now, investigators are starting their search for local victims.

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Deputies say they found the evidence at Joe Russel Burton's Altoona home. Investigators are going through his computer, trying to find out whether there are any local victims or other offenders who Burton sent the child porn to. They say he had a lot of it.

By day, 41-year-old Burton is a short-order cook who has made the rounds at small restaurants in Lake County. Investigators say, by night, when he's home alone, Burton has been doing a lot of chat rooms, surfing for young boys to send him photographs of themselves in sexually explicit situations. He admits to saving thousands of them.

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"They are still looking at his computer to see if we can identify any of these email addresses to be local. Hopefully, we don't have local victims here or children involved in the immediate area," comments Lake Co. Sheriff's Spokesperson Lt. Todd Luce.

Investigators questioned neighborhood children and their parents, but so far have not found any local victims.

Julie Bush says she watched over her young children like a hawk once she found out Burton is a registered sex offender.

"I just hope he stays away. Not that I would sick him on any other neighborhood. Just get out of mine," says Bush.

Burton had been convicted of the same thing before and spent a year in jail, plus four years probation, which ended at the beginning of the year. Now he's back at the Lake County jail.

"This goes to show, this is a definite illness. This man needs attention and help for his problem," says Lt. Luce.

Burton is being held at the Lake County jail on a half-million dollars bond. Investigators say he admitted to having a lot of child porn, but he did not want to talk to Channel 9 about it.